reverse communion slave orders

[militarist]

I'm doing my first communion..reverse communion this time.And it's in MP. I've read,of course all guides. unfortunately I found nowere examples with orders.

Do I undertsand properly, that if one of masters have orders

communion master,PoS,flee

then slave should have

communion slave, hold, cast spell?

And one more question. If slave is higher in the list then master, can he cast spell? and if can - is he still counted as a slave for the purpose of buffs casted by master and takes his share of fatigue?

[thejeff]

You understand correctly.

Communion slaves will not cast if a master has already cast that turn. Any slaves who acted first still get the benefit of buffs and absorbs the master's fatigue.
So if you can arrange your master to be last on the list, there is no need for him to retreat.

[militarist]

From communion guide: "The masters are boosted in all paths which they already have, while the slaves are boosted in all paths whether they have them or not. "

Does in mean that in reverse communion my mages will be able to use types of magic which they never had before? Or "in all paths" means only for the purpose of slave-casting, only for the calculation of fatigue loss when masters cast?

[Maerlande]

Your second statement is correct militarist. They can only cast spells of the paths they had before. But they do get boosted for fatigue.

Here's a typical reverse:

Yogi S1: Communion Slave, body ethereal, Soul Slay, SS, SS, Cast
Yogi: same
Yogi: same
Yogi: same
Yogi: Same
Yogi: same
Yogi: same
Yogi: same
Yogi (M): Communion master, PotS, personal luck, resist magic, SS, cast
Yogi (M): Communion master, LotNS, astral shield, SS,SS, cast

8 slaves: Each master is now +3 S. PotS gives all slaves +1. LotNS gives all slaves +1. Remember to give each master one pearl.

This communion can cast all day.

For real fun add slaves and a master with another path. Say ES. Then you add invulnerability. Or nature and add resist poison, elemental fortitude, and so on.

And for even more fun use one blood master.

B1 master: Sabbath master, buff, buff, buff, reinvigorate
This sets all slaves to zero fatigue.

You can also give the masters bows:
Master, PotS, buff, buff, buff, fire
This allows about 1 master for 3 slaves or so.

[militarist]

Sorry,not clear about bow. Why? Just not to overload slaves by fatigue?

[Quitti]

Correct, firing bow gives zero or neglible fatigue, and it allows the master to stay in the battlefield and even have some use without retreating, and it allows you to keep the master in the same prov after the fight, unlike retreating. All this while having your slaves spamming soul slay or something similar without any hinderance from your master.

[Jarkko]

B1 master: Sabbath master, buff, buff, buff, reinvigorate
This sets all slaves to zero fatigue.

Not quite true. It removes all other fatigue, except the fatigue caused by casting Reinvigorate. Usually no problem, but if you have for example 4 astral slaves (with no Blood) and 1 blood master, the slaves will end up with (100/4)x2=50 fatigue each (Reinvigoration causes 100 fatigue, split four ways for the slaves and then doubled for being one short of B1).

[Maerlande]

Good correction Jarkko. I've only used it with one blood master and many many slaves so I didn't even check the fatigue.

[chrispedersen]

And for even more fun use one blood master.

B1 master: Sabbath master, buff, buff, buff, reinvigorate
This sets all slaves to zero fatigue.


No it does not. The reduction in fatigue for a slave has less than b3 is minimal. Try it.

Oops: Ninja'd.

[aaminoff]

I have been meaning to ask about this, in the context of Blood Sabbaths.

So if you are a B1 mage, Sabbath Slave costs 100 fatigue. Sabbath Master costs 100 fatigue likewise. So that implies that if you do

slave - S slave
...
master - Sabbath master

and they are all B1 mages, everyone will end the turn asleep at 100+casting fatigue?

Well, thats no good. How about if I forge a communion master matrix, give it to the last guy.

slave
...
master - reinvigorate

The master, already being in the communion, will thus flush everyones' fatigue.

Alternatively, if I have (or can empower/boost) a mage at the beginning of the list to B2, then:

master B2 - S. Master, reinvig
slave B1 - S. slave, do something cool

I guess this would only be useful for a reverse communion where the slaves don't want to cast spells on turn 2, or can hold for a turn before running off.

My question is basically, are we certain that spells take effect at the instant they are cast? There isn't some sort of post-casting fatigue reconciliation phase and the effect of reinvig does not happen till then?

[Jarkko]

aaminoff, in vanilla game Sabbaths really require you to have at least B2 masters, preferably B3+, and if you are using B1 sabbath slaves, you will need lots and lots of them. Also, you can forget all thoughts about reverse communions if you use B1 sabbath slaves. With B2+ sabbath slaves reverse communions become decent though (as the sabbath slaves are likely to burn extra bloodslaves to cast Sabbath Slave, and thus gain less fatigue).

In CBM, where Sabbath Master and Sabbath Slave cost 99 fatigue, you can go with B1 sabbaths too, if you are careful to not cast heavily fatiguing spells. Both B1 Sabbath Masters and B1 Sabbath slaves will use one bloodslave (if they are available) and thus start the communion with 50 fatigue (still not ideal, but better than to start with 100...).

[chrispedersen]

do a search on hellpower + reinvigorate.
I published my results of those tests.

[chrispedersen]

Advanced Communion Guide 201

If you're very very careful and a little bit lucky - it doesn't matter how much reinvigoration gives you back, so long as that number is >0.

Fatigue pegs at 200 each and every time you are less than 200

Suppose a communion of 10 slaves and four masters. (yes, I know thats more than recommended). Master is a B4. He casts Pain transfer.

Somewhere down the line.. you're bumping at 200 fatigue. Master casts Reinvigorate. Fatigue of about 16 - which will kill two blood slaves. However the only thing that matters is that it bumps you *under* 200 fatigue. 199 is fine.

The next master casts a huge fatigue spell Darkness (for example). Every single slave is bumped to 200. And is capped there.

The next master (again) casts reinvig. Killing two more blood slaves. And bumping you under 200.

Following master casts another huge spell.

Etc.

The same technique (only better) can be used with the spells that remove fatigue - relief, summon earth power.

Where you put them in the communion has a huge bearing.

Relief will go off every round... usually I don't bother with trying to time it perfectly - I just make sure that the number of huge fatigue spells each round <= the number of fatigue removing effects going off.

And there are a huge number of creative ways to do this.

For example - separate your slaves a lot - and give them a body guard of trolls.
Have the master cast soul vortex....

[militarist]

Thanks, good example. But still I can't understand about reinvigoration...I just can't understand mathematics - is it possible in yuor case of 6 slaves, 4 masters, just by casting reinvig by second, 3d master to move fatigue of all to zero or close?

[chrispedersen]

My example was 8 slaves 4 masters.

I had worked out a formula to my satisfaction before... but I can't recall what it was. It was something like b^2 * 20 fatigue recovered...

And sure, its possible to reduce fatigue with 2nd or 3rd master. Thats just communion 101.

[militarist]

101?

[Stavis_L]

101?


http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/101

See the Adjective sense.

[Folket]

Maerlande example is all wrong.

Once the communion master casts communion master the slaves will not cast anything before the communion master do not cast for a turn.

Better to have the two master first in the orders.


Yogi (M): Communion master, PotS, retreat
Yogi (M): Communion master, LotNS, retreat
Yogi S1: Communion Slave, hold, Soul Slay, SS, SS, Cast
Yogi: same
Yogi: same
Yogi: same
Yogi: Same
Yogi: same
Yogi: same
Yogi: same

[Maerlande]

You should test that before you say it's wrong. I've been using that setup regularly in 5 games for months. Works just fine.

ChrisP's comment on the reinvigoration makes sense, but your's is incorrect. What you have shown works, but so does mine.

[Jarkko]

Folket, you are wrong. The communion slaves who act *before* the communion master will cast their spells as scripted, those communion slaves *after* the communion master will not cast anything if the master did cast something.

[Squirrelloid]

Maerlande example is all wrong.

Once the communion master casts communion master the slaves will not cast anything before the communion master do not cast for a turn.

No, the slaves will not cast anything in a turn iff a master casts before they get to act. If a slave acts before the first master, he may cast spells normally. Actually try it, it works.


Better to have the two master first in the orders.


Yogi (M): Communion master, PotS, retreat
Yogi (M): Communion master, LotNS, retreat
Yogi S1: Communion Slave, hold, Soul Slay, SS, SS, Cast
Yogi: same
Yogi: same
Yogi: same
Yogi: Same
Yogi: same
Yogi: same
Yogi: same

I dislike retreating the masters, and thus putting them on the top, because it breaks up your army for future use. Further, the effect of masters on communion slave fatigue is mostly irrelevant. You also only need one master:

S1s all

Slave1: Communion Slave, Hold, LotNS (2s), SSx2 (fatigued out - who cares?)
Slave2-n: CSlave, Hold, SSx3
Master: CMaster, PotS, SSx3

Each master SS produces a whopping 20/n fatigue for each slave, or ~2.5 fatigue per slave per casting with 8 slaves. Ie, not relevant.

[Calahan]

You should test that before you say it's wrong.
This probably ranks #1 on my request list of things people should always do before posting on game specifics.

Since a lot of tests take less than five minutes to perform, but doing so could avoid an awful lot of just plain wrong information appearing on the forum. If you're not sure about something, test it :) And then if your tests go against what people are saying, then by all means say so and post your test findings.

[/Rant about pet hate]

[Sombre]

And if you don't want to test something or can't test it, don't present what you believe as fact.

Too many times I have seen people quoting the manual as evidence that they are right about something, or simply saying "X works in Y way and never Z" without qualifying it. When I believe something from playing the game but haven't tested it, I will generally say something along the lines of "I am 80% sure of X and people seem to concur, but in order to be sure this requires a test".

[Calahan]

And if you don't want to test something or can't test it, don't present what you believe as fact.

LoL, and this is probably my #2 request :)